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On the night of March 5, 2002, Falun Gong practitioners broadcast a 50-minute long program explaining the truth about Falun Gong on Changchun cable TV networks, in spite of the government’s totalitarian control of the media. In reprisal, China News Net published a report from Beijing on April 1, 2002, recounting the March 5, 2002, Changchun TV incident and publishing the names of persons who were allegedly involved. The authorities arrested around 5,000 people allegedly involved.
Since October 26, 2003, more than 100 Falun Gong practitioners are being held in Jilin Prison, and most of them have gone on a hunger strike to protest the ongoing severe torture by prison guards. We call on the United Nations to safeguard their lives and defend the basic human rights of these practitioners.
Victims:
1. Lei Ming, male, resident of Jilin Province
2. Wang Guangyou, male, resident of Jilin Province
3. Xin Yuanjun, male, resident of Jilin Province
4. Yang Feng, male, resident of Jilin Province
5. Liu Zhaojian, male, resident of Baishan City, Jilin Province
6. Zhang Jianwei, male, resident of Jilin Province
7. Yun Qingbin, male, resident of Jilin Province
8. Zheng Weidong, male, resident of Jilin Province
9. Wei Xiushan, male, resident of Jilin Province
10. Zhang Hongwei, male, resident of Shulan City, Jilin Province
11. Liang Zhenxing, male, resident of Jilin Province
12. Yang Guang, male, resident of Jilin Province
13. Liu Chengjun, male, resident of Nongan County, Jilin Province
14. Zhou Runjun, male, resident of Jilin Province
Reason for Concern for the Practitioners’ Lives:
In the Jilin Prison, Jilin Province, Falun Gong practitioners are constantly being tormented in an attempt to brainwash them. The practitioners are deprived of sleep and pressured to write slanderous statements against, and their personal renunciations of Falun Gong. The officers order criminal inmates to torture the practitioners. The inmates can have their sentences reduced if they coerce the practitioners, using any vicious or inhumane means they choose, into writing slanderous statements against Falun Gong.
On March 5, 2002, police abducted Mr. Liu Chengjun alleging that he was involved in the incident of telling the truth about Falun Gong on the Changchun Cable TV System. When they found Mr. Liu, he was hiding out under a hay pile near his relative’s home. Police surrounded the pile and set it on fire. The police then shot him. The fire burned Mr. Liu's hand, and the bullet broke his leg. On September 20, 2003, the Changchun City Intermediate People's Court sentenced him to 19 years in prison. During the court trial, a large group of police beat the practitioners being tried and shocked them with electric batons to intimidate them so they would not uphold Falun Gong. The day after the trial, Mr. Liu was unable to walk because of the torture; he had to be carried back to his prison cell. In the prison, like many practitioners, Mr. Liu was often beaten and tortured. In October 2003, Mr. Liu held a hunger strike to protest the persecution at Jilin Prison. The prison authorities beat and tortured him until he was in critical condition and on the verge of death. On October 24, 2003, the authorities sent him into the Jilin City Central Hospital for emergency treatment. He is now unconscious at the hospital. His eyes lack luster and he has been in critical condition, breathes with an oxygen mask and is on IVs. The diagnosis showed that Mr. Liu has acute kidney failure and arrhythmia. He is on the verge of death. Because Mr. Liu’s story has been exposed on the Internet, the authorities have transferred him to an undisclosed location. The police keep his family under surveillance as they wish to prevent them from revealing the truth to the outside world.
The No. 4 Team Leader, Song, ordered his fellow inmates, Xu Zhigang and Gao Guoguang, to torture Mr. Lei Ming. They kicked his head and humiliated him by grabbing and kicking his private parts. Then, the prison guards fixed him onto a special bed. They tied his head and limbs down tightly so that he could not move at all. While in this excruciating position, they tried to have him write a statement renouncing Falun Gong.
Mr. Xin Yuanjun's was beaten so severely that his teeth were knocked out. Another practitioner was sent to the hospital for emergency treatment as a result of the beatings they received.
Inmates and guards placed Mr. Yan Feng under strict supervision.
Mr. Liu Zhaojian went on a hunger strike for eighty-three days and steadfastly refused to write any of the statements slandering and renouncing Falun Gong.
Mr. Zheng Weidong was often beaten, and watched when he went to the restroom. Once guards cuffed all four of his limbs and hung him up in the air for four days. As a result, his ankles, wrists, and all joints in his limbs were dislocated. His limbs were disabled after this torture.
Criminal inmates beat Mr. Liang Zhenxing under orders from the No. 6 Team Officer, Zhou.
Mr. Zhang Hongwei was twice forced to sit in one place without moving, for over two months.
Mr. Yang Guang was placed under strict supervision by inmates and guards for more than three months, and locked in small cell for more than two months. Mr. Yang was also shackled to a bed.
The practitioners in the prison have no freedom whatsoever. They are not allowed to talk to each other, and are under 24-hour surveillance. Likewise, the prison guards tie the practitioners to their beds by their heads and limbs at will. The practitioners are forced to get up at 5:30 a.m. and remain sitting in the same position until 7:30 p.m. in the evening. They are watched even when they use the restroom. The prison guards keep a surveillance log on a half-hour basis and report to their superior once every week. Other maltreatment includes confinement in a solitary compartment, and denial of correspondence or visits from family and friends. The practitioners held in the No. 7 Team are also deprived of sleep.
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